Preston North End Reaction - Cherries

17 Feb 2013 12:17:20

Here's the post match reaction from the Cherries camp after their run of 5 wins came to an end.

Manager Eddie Howe came out after the match to admit that the Cherries were not at their best, being quoted in the Bournemouth Evening Echo as saying: "We weren’t at our best – there is no doubting that. We were second best which is really difficult for me to say because it hadn’t happened yet. This was the first time. We were slow out of the traps, we conceded two poor goals, we never really had any concerted pressure on their goal and I think we have to try to forget this as quickly as possible. Of course, learn from it and analyse it, which we will, but we have some massive games coming up which will define our season. I think you can look for a combination of factors. We have had a lot of travelling, a lot of games and we have got some tired bodies. It was a really poor pitch again. It was the same for both teams but we didn’t react very well to it. But we didn’t play our best. We are the first to admit that and are not looking for excuses. We have to retain our long-term vision, see where we are in the table and collect all the positives from that and look forward because looking back is going to do us no good now. We were 4-4-2 with Brett Pitman just dropping in early on and we weren’t getting to grips with their midfield. We changed personnel – Marc Pugh was struggling through illness, he didn’t feel good during the game so we had to make that decision. In the second half, we tried to change again to try to get some momentum and try to get up the pitch. But I don’t think it was tactical today, there were bigger things that proved our downfall".